THE FORMEK RANGE OF THE REINDEER IN EUROPE. 37 
by Captain Liiard in the spring of 1867. In the gravels on 
which Oxford stands it is found in greatest abundance ; at Bedford 
it is associated with flint implements, the red-deer and the hip- 
popotamus ; at Lawford, near Eugby, with the cave hyaena ; at 
Fisherton, near Salisbury, with the cave lion, urus, roe-deer, 
marmot, and lemming ; in Kent also it is abundant in the brick 
earth of Sittingbourne and Maidstone ; in Somerset in the gravels 
of the Avon, near Bath. Altogether it has been determined in 
ten out of eighteen river deposits which have furnished fossil 
mammals, while the red-deer has been found only in nine. The 
remains also of the latter animal, even where they do occur, are 
few and scant, while those of the reindeer are so abundant that 
their numbers can only be accounted for on the hypothesis that 
vast herds adopted certain routes in their annual migrations and 
crossed the same rivers at the same points, just as they do 
at the present day in the northern regions. In Siberia, for in- 
stance, Admiral von Wrangel writes'*' — “The migrating body 
of reindeer consists of many thousands, and though they are 
divided into herds of two or three hundred each, yet the herds 
keep so near together as to form only one immense mass, which 
is sometimes from fifty to a hundred wersts (or thirty to sixty 
miles) in breadth. They always follow the same route, and in 
crossing the river Aniuj near Plobischtsche they choose a place 
where a dry valley leads down to a stream on one side, and a flat 
sandy shore facilitates their landing on another. As each sepa- 
rate herd approaches the river the deer draw more closely together, 
and the largest and strongest take the lead. He advances, closely 
followed by a few of the others, with head erect and apparently 
intent on examining the locality ; when he has satisfied himself 
he enters the river, the rest of the herd crowd after him, and in 
a few minutes the surface is covered with them.” There could 
not fail to be many casualties in a vast migratory body such as 
this, and doubtless even were the hunter, and the animals that in- 
variably prey upon such a herd, absent, many of the weaker 
animals would be swept down by the current and drowned, and 
their bones would lie in great abundance at some points below 
the reindeer fords. In this way the vast quantity of the remains 
of reindeer accumulated at certain points in the ancient river 
beds, as for instance at Windsor, may be accounted for. With 
the exception of the horse, mammoth, and perhaps the bison, its 
numbers were larger in post-glacial Britain than any other 
animal. 
* Siberia and Polar Sea. Trans, by Major Sabine, 1840; 8vo., p. 190, 
A werst is about two-thirds of an English statute mile. There must be some 
mistake in this estimate of breadth ; for no observer could see a body of deer 
of that width in a country so full of ups and downs as that of the Aniuj. 
The numbers must have been incalculable. 
